


Always Breaking Everything

by Dira Sudis (dsudis)



Series: The World That You Need [13]
Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Jealousy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 20:58:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3743353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsudis/pseuds/Dira%20Sudis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>"It's not that I want details," Aral said, keeping his voice even, reasonable. "I just want a little peace of mind--to know when I can expect to be tripping over someone who might proposition you, you know. Can you tell me how many of them there are, at least?"</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always Breaking Everything

**Author's Note:**

> This story, and the rest of this series, proceed according to my original plan for them, without reference to any spoilers for _Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen_.
> 
> This story is therefore safe for the unspoiled reader, but I suspect the comment section will not be. Caveat lector.
> 
> Many thanks to commodorified for beta, and to Rubynye, Petra, Ellen Fremedon, and Iulia for audiencing and encouraging me through the "oh no, no, this story is a terrible idea" stage. <3

It was nothing, really. Even as it was happening Aral was telling himself that it was nothing: from the first glance it was clear that Arkady's body language was projecting a polite but firm rejection.

Colonel Voranisimov was projecting something else entirely, however. Not just interest--Aral had spotted that more than once directed at Arkady, even within the precincts of his own office--but recognition. Familiarity. A certain expectation of a favorable response, and, when Arkady shook his head slightly and shifted his weight back, a faint surprise that vanished almost instantly into smooth professionalism. 

It was nothing; it was an exchange that lasted a couple of seconds, a discreet pass discreetly rejected. Aral had only happened to look up and catch sight of the brief encounter taking place just past the door to his inner office as Voranisimov departed in Minister Vorlynkin's train. If he hadn't happened to see, he'd never have known; he might have missed such moments a dozen times in the months he'd known Arkady. A hundred times.

There were, after all, some number of men who knew about Arkady for the very good reason that they'd had sex with him--they were on the inside of that little circle of oath-bound trust with him, vouched for by Vorgorov and his organization. Simon would know who they were; Hector Vorgorov knew how they were. Given Arkady's preferences, they would be men well advanced in their careers--military men. More likely than average to have some dealings with the Prime Minister's office, sooner or later. He might have spoken to dozens of men who'd had sex with Arkady just once. He'd never know the difference if he hadn't happened to see.

But he had seen, and now he knew that Voranisimov was one of them, and had wanted another round.

Arkady caught his eye, frowning slightly--Aral's expression was giving _something_ away, though he wasn't sure what. Arkady stepped inside, close enough to say softly, "Sir?"

Aral shook his head. It was nothing he had any good reason to plague Arkady with. Even if he was going to bring it up, this was neither the time nor the place. "It's fine, Lieutenant. Who have you got next?"

Arkady searched his gaze for another few seconds, but there was, after all, nothing to say. It had been nothing, and Arkady knew better than to launch into unprompted denials or explanations. After another few seconds he nodded and introduced Aral's next appointment.

* * *

Aral put it out of his mind, but like a splinter under the skin it was still _there_ , sending up little unpleasant darts of awareness from time to time. It was only when they were at last alone in the groundcar, headed back to Vorkosigan House for a late lunch, that Aral couldn't push away the knowledge anymore. He sat across from Arkady--blamelessly occupied with a comm panel, sorting out some particularly thorny organizational five-space math--and saw it all over again, the flash of knowing communication between Arkady and Voranisimov.

He tried to think of it as a tactical problem, but that question evaporated before it formed--Voranisimov's approach to Arkady was the best possible demonstration of the fact that Voranisimov had no idea who Arkady was currently involved with. Even if he did work out the truth, his silence was already assured years ago, and so was the silence of anyone else Arkady had ever slept with. There was no threat here, or none that it was Aral's personal responsibility to address; Simon and Vorgorov had been handling it for decades without his ever having any reason to know. He knew he could trust them to go right on doing so. 

It was just that he knew a name now. A face. 

"Arkady," Aral said, and Arkady looked up at him instantly, like he'd been waiting for it. For a moment they simply looked at each other, and Aral saw the wariness in Arkady's eyes and pushed almost on reflex. "Voranisimov--"

Arkady looked down again sharply. "No, sir."

Aral stopped short, leaving a silence.

"I can't tell you anything, Aral," Arkady said evenly, without looking up. "I won't. I shouldn't have--you shouldn't have been allowed to see."

"Because I'm not one of you," Aral said, prodding irresistibly at the sore place. Because for all he'd gone to Vorgorov--for all he'd been given permission to have what he had with Arkady--he did not belong inside that trusted circle. He had sworn no oaths and been promised no protection. 

"Because it doesn't concern you," Arkady said, still without looking up, though there was a very faint tremor in his voice now, betraying his struggle to be calm and matter of fact. "No one is supposed to know anything he doesn't need to know. It does no one any good for you to know anything about anyone other than me."

"Hm," Aral said, because he couldn't argue that it _did_ do him any good to know. It assuredly did not.

But he knew now, and he couldn't stop knowing.

* * *

They ate together--Aral half-expected to be abandoned for the kitchens, but Arkady followed him, perhaps a little defiantly, up to the private dining room as usual when they were home for lunch this late. They were both quiet, conversation occurring in short, self-conscious fits while they both silently skirted the elephant in the room.

Arkady gave up on eating even before Aral did, and that seemed like a sign that they might as well just have the thing out and be done with it. 

"I realize that you can't tell me anything about--the man you spoke to today," Aral said. He wasn't going to harp on Voranisimov's name. This wasn't about him, not really. It wasn't about any one of them, as such. "I won't ask you anything about him."

Arkady nodded slowly.

"I'm just curious about all the others," Aral said.

Arkady's wary expression reappeared, and Aral knew better, but it felt like blood in the water, like an admission of guilt. He was distantly aware that he ought to stop, but he pressed the weakness, driven by a suppressed feeling that abruptly revealed itself as fury, dark and vicious. _All the others_ , God knew--Simon knew, Vorgorov knew, but Aral could never know--how many. He could ask that, at least.

"It's not that I want details," Aral said, keeping his voice even, reasonable. "I just want a little peace of mind--to know when I can expect to be tripping over someone who might proposition you, you know. Can you tell me how many of them there are, at least?"

"No," Arkady said flatly, sitting back and folding his arms and looking exactly like a defiant child. 

Aral raised his eyebrows. "No you can't tell me, or no you won't?"

Arkady was flushing darkly across his cheeks, anger or shame or both, but he said tightly, "No. I can't tell you how many times I've jerked off since I was sixteen, either, or how many porn vids I've watched. It didn't mean anything."

"There is a _slight_ difference," Aral said. "But I don't need to lecture you about discretion, do I? You are the model of discretion, after all. Even to me you won't say a word. But then I'm not cleared to know--you'll tell Vorgorov everything, won't you?"

"Aral," Arkady said, unfolding his arms to gesture helplessly. "It's not--I'm not going to tell you anything, and there's nothing to worry about. Anyone could proposition me--"

"True," Aral snapped, and God knew it _was_ true, Arkady drew attention from everyone--that idiot _Ivan_ had seemed to have a crush the last time Aral ran across him--

"I'm not going to tell you anything," Arkady repeated stubbornly. "It wasn't--they weren't important. They weren't _relationships_. It wasn't like it is with us."

"What was it like, then? Tell me that," Aral demanded, and he was aware, again, that he had lost his cool and reasonable edge, that he was exposing something he should be holding back, but Arkady was _his_ , and no one else--no one--

"No," Arkady said sharply, standing, and Aral stood too, stepping around the table so that nothing was between them. Arkady swayed back but didn't yield his ground to the extent of taking a step back. 

"You don't have to tell me in words," Aral said, his voice going low and smooth again as the vision of it loomed--the crowd of men who had been where he had been, who had touched Arkady the way Aral touched him, seen him the way Aral saw him, who knew what he was not allowed to know. "You can just show me--we can play pretend. I'll be some officer--any one will do, after all, and you--"

"You can go to hell," Arkady snarled, low and fierce, and his hand shot out, his open palm shoving against Aral's chest and rocking him onto his heels. 

Aral froze, abruptly aware of having gone entirely too far, and in the silence Arkady dropped his hand, took a parade-precise step back and said, "No. Sir. I was taught from an early age never to play the game where the other fellow calls you a whore. It's never really a game."

Aral opened his mouth, but Arkady didn't give him time to speak, turning sharply on his heel and walking out in long strides. He closed the door with silent precision behind him.

Aral raised one hand to rub at his face, letting the sick sense of realization set in. He had been fighting far out of his weight class, there, and he'd been wildly, cruelly careless about it. The furious burn of jealousy collapsed into ash, leaving him conscious of the grasping, ugly fear that always underlay it: Arkady could do better, and Aral had just helpfully demonstrated one of the dozen reasons why. Colonel Voranisimov wasn't just twenty years younger and infinitely less dangerous, he also wan't a _cruel bastard_ to Arkady over phantoms in the middle of the workday. 

Aral took a few more breaths, considering the timing and Arkady's likely points of refuge and walking speed, and then he keyed on his wrist comm and called the office, something he almost never did. Arkady was always there to do it for him. He promptly reached his XO, and made his voice bland and even as he said, "Vorlaisner, has Jole called in to put himself on the sick list?"

There was a split second's pause that was the most curiosity or judgment Vorlaisner was going to express to him about the nature of that question, and then he said, "Yes sir, just this second. Twenty-six hours, so it didn't require your approval."

"Quite," Aral said, and before Vorlaisner could read anything into that, "Good, I was worried he would try to go back to work. He was looking ghastly. I'll be back as scheduled."

"Yes, sir," Vorlaisner agreed. "I'll scramble one of the aides to cover your afternoon."

"Thank you," Aral said, "Vorkosigan out."

He set a timer, because Arkady wasn't going to remind him when he had to get down to the groundcar to go back to work, and then he sat down to consider exactly how he was going to make this right once he'd given Arkady at least eight of the twenty-six hours of peace he'd just demanded for himself. Tactical calculations kept being overridden by that last sight of Arkady's face, furious and hurt and driven to self-defense, and he hadn't gotten very far before the timer chimed and he had to return his attention unwillingly to the work of government.

* * *

His day in the office was capped by a moderately official dinner at Vorkosigan House--no dancing and very little arm-wrestling, apt to be over by 2400. He had ten minutes alone with Cordelia beforehand, and she took one look at him as she finished arranging her jewelry and said, "What in the world have you done to lose your shadow?"

Aral winced and said, "Only temporarily mislaid, I hope."

Cordelia's eyebrows rose at that, and she turned to face him squarely. "Aral? What did you _do_?"

Aral shook his head slightly. "I have a very important apology to make, after this. And getting everyone expeditiously out the door tonight is as much intercession as I will ask of you, Dear Captain."

"Mm," Cordelia said. "I think that's within reasonable bounds. But if you haven't got it sorted by this time tomorrow I'm going to ask Arkady whether _he'd_ like me to intercede."

"And I would deserve it," Aral agreed, trying not to let himself conjure up too vivid an image of his beloveds teaming up to take arms against him. "But I still have hopes that I may avert that fate."

Cordelia nodded firmly and got back to fiddling with her hair, and Aral considered the angle of her shoulders--slightly more relaxed than he expected--and added, "We have the Vormuirs tonight."

Cordelia's hands stilled again, and she blew out a breath and shook her head minutely, Aral's cue to come over and lend a hand getting her hair in order without letting it tangle in her jewelry. When he kissed her behind her ear, she turned and pressed his lips to his, and that was enough to go on for the next few hours.

* * *

He and Cordelia were remarkably efficient, and it was just past 2400 as Aral exited the lift tube behind Sergeant Schwartz, on the fifth floor of Arkady's building. Schwartz, as a member of his ImpSec detail, was still unhappy about Aral's cavalier treatment of security procedures, but he had required no real persuasion to commit to this late and hastily-strategized errand. Aral suspected that Cordelia wasn't the only person planning to make his life a hell if he couldn't make things up with Arkady; he'd gotten some very chilly looks from the Vorkosigan House staff tonight.

He strode directly to the door of the correct flat, not allowing himself to hesitate or double check the address with Schwartz, and pressed the buzzer.

The silence on the other side seemed very long. Aral stood still, waiting.

Finally Arkady's voice issued from the speaker, sounding exquisitely controlled. "You came to speak to me in person?"

Aral nodded, returning equal restraint. "I did."

There was another long pause, and then Arkady said, "You came to speak to me in person without letting your advance security team know to clear the flat?"

Aral raised his eyebrows slightly, and Schwartz moved from his position flanking the door to stand in vid pickup range at Aral's shoulder. 

"Sergeant, you come in first," Arkady directed, and when the door opened no one was visible behind it. 

Aral obediently stepped aside, letting Schwartz shoulder in and carry out that bit of unnecessary precaution. Aral glanced toward the lift tube, where another ImpSec man waited, lest the Prime Minister spend a moment standing in an empty corridor alone. Aral did not allow himself to fidget.

Schwartz came back out, looking slightly less grim than he had all the way over while Aral was insisting that no one was going to bother Lieutenant Jole with clearing his flat. He jerked his chin, silently indicating that Aral should go inside, and Aral went where he had been bidden, stepping over the threshold into Arkady's flat and sealing the door behind him. 

The little entryway opened into a combined sitting and dining room, the kitchen area occupying an interior corner. The only light turned on was there, above the sink.

Arkady was standing three meters away with his back to Aral. He had his arms folded, and he was wearing soft pajama trousers and a mismatched shirt going threadbare at the elbows, the collar stretched asymmetrically, exposing the top of his left shoulder. His feet were bare, and his hair was standing at angles, as if he'd been in bed, though Aral didn't think he'd been asleep.

"You came to apologize," Arkady said, and like his pronouncements through the door comm it was not a question, and was spoken in a carefully controlled tone.

"Yes," Aral said. "As abjectly as you will allow. If you'd rather I did that at some other time or place--"

Arkady shook his head sharply, his shoulders hunching a little, and Aral fell silent.

"Are you on a very tight schedule?" Arkady asked next, and Aral's heart felt cracked in half. As though this might be an errand allotted a ten-minute block on his night's itinerary.

"No," Aral said softly. "I have nowhere else to be until I'm due at the office in the morning. I am entirely at your service."

"Then could you just," Arkady waved a hand in the direction of the sitting room furniture, a couch and chair, then ran that hand through his disarrayed hair. "I'm not quite... Could you wait?"

His voice pitched up on that question, wobbling almost out of control, and Aral squeezed his own eyes shut. He had been braced for Arkady's fury, for submitting to recriminations and all the yet more cutting things Arkady had thought of to say since he left Vorkosigan House. There was no way to brace for this quiet, determinedly contained hurt.

"I'll wait," Aral agreed.

Arkady nodded and walked away, down the darkened hallway that must lead to the bedroom. The door closed firmly behind him. 

Aral moved to the couch, turning on a lamp as he went so that he would be visible when Arkady returned. He took off his uniform tunic--he really ought to have worn civvies for this, if only he had any that were presentable in public, but he could at least be as informal as possible now that he was indoors. Then he sat and waited.

It was a strangely unaccustomed sensation, waiting with nothing else to occupy him. He had for a very long time now been a person other people waited for--Arkady's job was largely made up of waiting for him, in fact. It was only fair, then, that Aral should now wait for him. He studied the walls--sparsely decorated with flat pictures--and the ceiling--entirely unremarkable--and tried to think of how to apologize adequately for the quiet pain in Arkady's voice.

He was still not quite ready when he heard the bedroom door open and soft footfalls coming toward him. Aral had a second to be seized with the horrible vision of Arkady coming back in full uniform, hair neatly combed. He turned his head to see Arkady still in his sick-day clothes and felt a rush of relief despite the fact that Arkady had his arms defensively folded over his belly, head down so that Aral couldn't get a clear look at his face past his hair, which had been neatened a little but not combed. 

Arkady sat down at the couch, at Aral's side but with some space between them. He said quietly, almost without inflection, "All right. Go ahead."

Aral winced at that distinctly unencouraging opening. It demanded, among other things, that he keep the apology to words, spoken as matter-of-factly as possible. So. "I am sorry. I was cruel to you, and I hurt you, in ways that you did not deserve--could not have deserved, whatever your past conduct. I let my tendency toward jealousy get the better of me when I should have known to guard you from it, and in the future I will. I will do better, if you will allow me the chance."

It wasn't enough; no apology was ever really enough, until and unless it was made so by fiat. 

Arkady nodded slowly, every motion still deliberate, still self-protectively controlled, and Aral's heart sank.

Arkady turned his head, looking directly at Aral for the first time; he looked braced for impact, and his eyelids were pink and tender-looking though the whites of his eyes were unblemished. He must have used eyedrops, Aral thought irrelevantly, just before Arkady said, "And do you forgive me for being a whore?"

Aral's mouth dropped open, and Arkady's went tight, making a grim, hard line, before he added, with growing unsteadiness in his voice, "Because you love me so much? Because I was led astray at such an impressionable age?"

Aral shook his head, and Arkady looked sharply away again, his shoulders hunched hard.

"No," Aral repeated. To hell with respecting Arkady's attempts to keep this cool and dignified, as he perhaps imagined grownups did these things. Aral was seized all over again with the realization that this--he--was Arkady's first serious romantic relationship. He'd never done this before, never gotten close enough to anyone to be hurt this badly by them; however much sex he'd had before they met, he had given his heart all new and untouched to Aral, and Aral had shredded it.

Aral got off the couch and dropped to his knees in front of Arkady, reaching up to touch his chin when he tried to duck his head down further, though he didn't exert enough force to make Arkady meet his eyes.

"No," Aral repeated, "No, I can't forgive that, because there's nothing for me to forgive. It wouldn't be my business to forgive you if you'd been selling yourself for ten marks in the Great Square before I met you and it's certainly not for me to judge you for managing your sex life according to the best advice available to you. No. I was being a jealous old fool, Arkan. You didn't do anything wrong. You never did. You couldn't. They were your choices to make and nothing to do with me."

Arkady slowly uncurled as Aral spoke, meeting his eyes with something awfully like _hope_ at the end of it, as though merely not being despised was the best he could imagine right now. Aral shook his head, shifting his hand to cradle Arkady's cheek.

"You deserve better than I was today," he said softly. "You weren't wrong to trust me not to hurt you--I was wrong to do it. You aren't wrong to be hurt. You don't have to pretend to me that you're not, or forgive me just because I'm more sorry than words can say. I still hurt you." A tear spilled from Arkady's eye, slipping down to run across the place where Aral's thumb met his cheek, and Arkady shook his head slightly, tilting his head into Aral's touch. 

"I'm sorry," Aral repeated, at a loss for better words. "I was a bastard and I love you and I'm sorry--"

Almost in one motion, Arkady's shoulders heaved with something that looked like a sob, however silent he kept it, and Arkady lunged down, pressing his mouth to Aral's in a clumsy kiss. Aral kissed back with rough fervor, curling one arm around Arkady's shaking shoulders and swallowing the sound of Arkady's shuddery breaths.

"Aral," Arkady muttered against his mouth, and Aral almost laughed with relief--he'd been listening for _sir_ at best, _Admiral_ at worst, but Arkady hadn't called him anything at all until that. "Aral--"

Arkady's hands were clenched in Aral's shirt, but one released long enough to punch him hard in the shoulder. It was enough to make him reel back a little, and Arkady nearly fell off the couch onto him trying to keep kissing him through it. 

" _Asshole_ ," Arkady snarled before he closed another kiss, and Aral did let himself laugh a little then, getting a firm grip on Arkady. Aral pushed up to join him on the couch, which ended in some shoving that might have been catharsis or simply Arkady having definite ideas on how he wanted them arranged. They ended with Aral sitting tucked into the corner of the couch, Arkady sitting between his legs with his back against Aral's chest--no more kisses, for the moment, but probably no more punching either. 

Aral kissed the nape of his neck and the spot behind his ear while Arkady pulled Aral's arms firmly around himself, laying his own arms over them. 

"Also," Aral said softly, because he thought Arkady might be able to hear it now, "A howling hypocrite, if it makes you feel better. I'm fairly certain I have you beat on the scale of my reckless promiscuity, if only by the accumulation of years--I didn't get out of that phase until I was well into my thirties, and flirted with it all over again after the Escobar War. Desperately drunk for quite a lot of it, so I couldn't tell you who I'd slept with if I wanted to, in most cases, let alone how many. Except--"

He hesitated, wondering if this would be unwelcome information; it did seem vaguely incestuous. 

"Well don't stop _there_ ," Arkady said, nudging him sharply with an elbow. 

Aral kissed the side of his throat by way of crying truce and said, "Vorgorov and Trottier. Together." Arkady twisted, and Aral loosened his grip enough to let him turn, facing Aral with an expression--not entirely shocked, but like he was desperately trying to assimilate new information that set all his internal maps askew. Worlds colliding, Aral supposed.

"I really don't remember most of that one," Aral went on, giving Arkady a moment to process, "except that they were much kinder to me than I deserved. This was after the war, I was a vaguely suicidal alcoholic--not good company for anyone, and I was particularly--"

"God, I'm an idiot," Arkady interrupted, rubbing his face. "I just realized--" he huffed a little laugh, sounding as shaky as anything else. "Speaking of howling hypocrites. The two of them have been together all along, haven't they?"

Aral was taken entirely off-guard by the question and had to scramble for an answer. 

"So it seemed to me," he said hesitantly, trying to remember what casual reference Vorgorov had made, the better part of a year ago when Aral went to him to speak about Arkady. "But perhaps--"

"No, you're right, it's obvious now that I think about it." Arkady leaned back against Aral again, and Aral closed his arms firmly around Arkady's chest as he snuggled into place. "Just--all those years of them insisting that I mustn't get attached, mustn't get into relationships, attachments are how you get caught, jealousy makes you stupid--"

"Well they had that part right," Aral interposed, and Arkady reached back and flicked him unerringly on the cheek. 

"And they were together all the time," Arkady said, sounding so exactly like an aggrieved teenager that Aral had to hide a grin in his hair. "Tonton and Tatie, ha, everyone else probably figured that out in five minutes and I never thought it was anything but what we called them."

"Well, you were sixteen when you formed your first impressions," Aral said. "Those can be hard to shake. They were adults, you believed what they told you. You trusted them."

Arkady shook his head, tugging Aral's arms around himself again as he said, "Anyway. You were telling me about how you used to make horrible choices."

"Mm," Aral agreed. "I fear I've always needed sensible people to save me from myself, and my twenties were particularly lacking in sensible people I was at all willing to listen to on that score."

"Do tell," Arkady said, and it was unmistakably an order. Aral kissed the back of his neck thoughtfully, searching for a story he remembered well enough to tell, one that wasn't dire or vile but merely embarrassingly irresponsible. 

He huffed a laugh against the back of Arkady's neck when he thought of it and said, "No shit, there I was, twenty-four years old and celebrating my promotion to lieutenant commander--"

"Nepotism," twenty-six-year-old Lieutenant Jole groused, and Aral gave him another kiss.

"Guilty as charged," Aral agreed. "Now, shh, let me tell you the story. Somebody had the clever idea to bring out maple mead, me being a Vorkosigan..."

* * *

He managed to make Arkady laugh a few times--and even better, at some point while Aral was telling a not-at-all salacious story about flying the Dendarii Gorge, Arkady's interjections turned into mere sleepy noises. He had been resting more and more heavily against Aral the longer Aral spoke, and now he melted entirely, surrendering in sleep. Aral trailed off into silence and leaned his forehead against Arkady's hair, feeling more forgiven by Arkady's dozing off than he could by any words.

Arkady startled awake just before Aral made up his mind to wake him. He twisted in Aral's arms and looked back and forth from Aral's face to his surroundings for a few seconds as though trying to reconcile them before he said, "Huh," and squirmed up to give Aral a kiss. 

Then he levered himself up with youthful effortlessness and offered Aral a hand. "Come on, bed."

Aral nodded, taking Arkady's assistance to get up off the couch. Arkady shut off the lamp and towed Aral by the hand through the dimness of his flat, into the outright darkness of the bedroom. 

"Here," Arkady said, delivering him to the edge of the bed before he turned on the small light beside it, revealing a simple double bed with the covers all in a tangle and the pillows punched into shape to cradle one head. "Um--sorry, it's--"

"It's fine," Aral assured him, pushing Arkady gently toward the bed. Arkady stripped off his shirt and then climbed in, rearranging covers and pillows neatly while Aral perched on the edge to get out of his boots and the rest of his uniform, leaving only his underwear on. He took the spot Arkady had made for him--the left side, the same way they slept in Arkady's bed at Vorkosigan House--and shut off the light. Arkady scooted close immediately, sprawling half across him again as though Aral might try to get away. As though he had any interest in being anywhere but here, in this tiny junior officer's flat, in Arkady's bed. 

Running his hand over Arkady's hair, Aral said, quietly, "Arkan."

Arkady's arm over his chest tightened, and Arkady said firmly, "Apology accepted. I do forgive you. Now go to sleep."

Aral smiled and closed his eyes. "Yes, Lieutenant."


End file.
